How many hosts is Microsoft phoning everything home to? Is it feasible to just block them all with an external firewall so a Windows box simply can’t reach Microsoft?

The article below says that Windows 10 is ignoring the hosts file and phoning home anyway, so it seems like an external firewall would be the way to go.

Of course, as soon as you get your Microsoft blacklist established, if you’re still pulling OS updates, Microsoft could just change the hosts that the telemetry apps are using, and you’re back to square one. You would have to use a packet sniffer, firewall log, etc and make a new catalog of hosts that Microsoft is using.

*pfft* It’s a shit sandwich, no doubt about it.

As bad as this situation is, my guess is that it’s overly optimistic to assume that 1% of Windows users even care. Of that 1%, maybe 1% of those users are able to run any sort of technical countermeasures. I hope this disaster doesn’t embolden Apple to screw its OSX users over in a similar manner.

Via: ghacks:

Windows 7 and 8 users have been plagued by “upgrade preparation” updates but left alone otherwise up until recently when it comes to this new level of data collecting.

This changed recently with the release of several updates for both operating systems that step up the game.

KB3068708 Update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry – This update introduces the Diagnostics and Telemetry tracking service to existing devices. By applying this service, you can add benefits from the latest version of Windows to systems that have not yet upgraded. The update also supports applications that are subscribed to Visual Studio Application Insights. (Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1), and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1) KB3022345 (replaced by KB3068708) Update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry – This update introduces the Diagnostics and Telemetry tracking service to in-market devices. By applying this service, you can add benefits from the latest version of Windows to systems that have not yet been upgraded. The update also supports applications that are subscribed to Visual Studio Application Insights. (Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1), and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1) KB3075249 Update that adds telemetry points to consent.exe in Windows 8.1 and Windows 7 – This update adds telemetry points to the User Account Control (UAC) feature to collect information on elevations that come from low integrity levels. (Windows 8.1, Windows RT 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1), and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1) KB3080149 Update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry – This package updates the Diagnostics and Telemetry tracking service to existing devices. This service provides benefits from the latest version of Windows to systems that have not yet upgraded. The update also supports applications that are subscribed to Visual Studio Application Insights. (Windows 8.1, Windows RT 8.1, Windows Server 2012 R2, Windows 7 Service Pack 1 (SP1), and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1)

If these updates are installed on the system, data is sent to Microsoft regularly about various activities on it.

Microsoft lists two host names in KB3068708 that data is received from and sent to:

vortex-win.data.microsoft.com settings-win.data.microsoft.com

These, and maybe others, appear to be hardcoded which means that the Hosts file is bypassed automatically.